CLEVELAND — The Lakers’ worst performance of the young season, a 134-110 blowout loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday night, produced one bright spot.
After hearing the fans chanting his name for parts of the fourth quarter, Lakers rookie guard Bronny James delivered a memorable moment just 30 miles north of his hometown of Akron, Ohio, knocking down a 14-foot jumper late in the fourth quarter for his first NBA points.
“To see him get his first NBA basket in this arena, where he grew up not too far away from here, it’s an unbelievable moment,” said Lakers star LeBron James, his father and teammate. “An unbelievable moment for him, first of all. For our family. It’s just pretty cool to be a part of it.”
There was a buzz in the arena throughout the game, with Wednesday being the lone regular-season visit to Cleveland for the Lakers, LeBron James and Bronny James.
LeBron, an Akron, Ohio native, played for the Cavaliers (2003-2010; 2014-18) twice and helped deliver the franchise’s lone NBA championship in 2016.
Bronny, the Lakers’ second-round pick in June’s NBA draft, grew up in Northeast Ohio when LeBron was playing for the Cavaliers.
So once it became clear Wednesday’s game was fully in the Cavaliers’ favor and was no longer competitive, the fans at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse started to chant “We want Bron-ny!”
And once he subbed into the game with the Lakers trailing 119-98 with 5:16 left, those chants turned into “Bron-ny!”
And once the 20-year-old rookie knocked down his first jumper, the crowd erupted into cheers – even for a player on the opposing team.
“It was insane,” Bronny said. “Much more than I anticipated for sure. But it’s all love. It was a nice moment. The chants really got me. I was straight-faced, but I felt it and it felt really good, especially coming from here. It was a special moment for me for sure.”
LeBron was impressed with how his son handled the moment.
“My sense is that he’s better than I would have been in that situation,” the elder James said. “Twenty thousand fans screaming my name to get in the game, and wanting me to be in the game. If the role’s reversed, I don’t know if I would have been able to handle it. Just commend him on his composure, the way he approaches, not only the game, but just approach, life in general.”
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LACK OF PUNCH
The Lakers entered Wednesday last in the NBA in bench scoring at 16.8 points per game, more than four points worse than the Sacramento Kings, whose 21.5 ppg ranked 29th.
The Lakers’ bench scored just six points in the first three quarters before the non-competitive fourth, in which both emptied their benches.
Rookie wing Dalton Knecht scored all 18 of his points in the final quarter.
Coach JJ Redick said before the game that he wasn’t overly concerned with the lack of scoring from the bench.
“The way our rotation works, we almost always have our primary scorers on the floor,” Redick said. “In terms of bench points, that’s not something that’s a big thing. It’s truthfully, outside of Dalton, like for all those guys, that’s not what we’re asking them to do. Want those guys to be banshees. We want them to be maniacs and guard and crash and be disruptive and create pace.”